Where can you find your next talented leader?.

by outlinesdesign, 27th July 2020

The question of leadership and succession planning

The question of leadership often comes up when discussing growth or succession plans with clients. The typical statements I hear are “where do I find good leaders?”, “I don’t want to give up the reigns” or “no one can run my business like me”.

If you truly want to grow and eventually sell your business, you need talented leaders in place below you, and you need them now.

Where do you find talented leaders?

They are most likely sat right under your nose. What you need to do is identify them and then develop them into leaders. You need to fill your management team with leadership and learning development.

This means you, if you want to appeal to your existing employees and keep them in-house, you must develop them.

Top tips to keep employees engaged

Here are my tips to help keep your employees engaged, loyal and on their toes in a competitive marketplace.

1. Look into the future and see what roles you need to help your business grow and scale. Start preparing your employees to take on these roles now.
2. Play to your employee’s strengths and develop them. Strengths are what make the employee’s good at their job, so nurture and enhance them.
3. Managers have employees andleaders have followers. Teach your employees to lead, to encourage, to motivate and develop others. Provide them with the tools to coach and mentor others in the business, to create loyalty. The results will surprise you.
4. Don’t only look at your best billers. Expand your horizons and look for the people who are truly invested in your business with their hearts and minds.
5. Create a learning platform to teach your management team what they don’t know. Most employees in your business will have only seen your management styleand maybe a few others, so they only know what they know. Bring in experts to help teach them what they don’t know.

The war on talent is everywhere. If you want to keep your staff loyal, motivated and produce brilliant leaders, develop and nurture them as your own because they are yours (for now), so look after them.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on developing leaders of the future. Get in touch with one of our trusted advisors to see if we can help you develop your management team.

Howard Greenwood, Co-Founder & Director at Jump Advisory